The Road Ahead
by Luckynumber4
Summary: Two friends from Florida head out to California in to race with the best and become the best. They make friends and enemies along the way. It's taking some time, but we're working on it
1. California Dreamin'

The concrete freeway stretching out in front of me seems endless as we cruise through the desert at eighty miles per hour. It's getting late and we've been driving since the crack of dawn. I was getting tired and hoping we would be able to make Los Angeles by nightfall.

We drive for another hour before I see a road sign. Only forty-two miles until we cross the L.A. city limits. I can't here it at first over the music, but my Nextel beeps. I reach out and pick it up from the passengers seat. "Yeah?"

"Hey, Danielle lets pull over and take a break for a minute."

I peer through the rear view mirror at the RX-8 riding my tail. "I hear you. There's a rest stop in a few miles. We'll pull off there."

I lie down on the hood of my car parked at the rest stop and examine the red and black Gibson les Paul tattooed on my forearm. Nick is on the cell phone telling his mom he's okay. I laugh and yell, "Are you done talking on the phone?" Nick holds up his finger, "like one minute." We only have about twenty miles left until we hit L.A. I step back into my car and turn on my stereo a few minutes later as Nick finally hangs up the phone. "What took you so long, Nick?"

"Danielle, my mom is crazy. She won't let five minutes pass without her callin me."

"Whatever, dude." I say.

I peer over the dashboard and watch as five suped up cars pull into the rest stop. _Must be coming back from Race Wars_, I thought to myself. _I got some nice cash there; Nick got a whole lot though, that lucky bastard._

I see a group of four people walking towards Nick and I. This one lady walking with them yells, "V. shut up already! God you just ate an hour ago!" The scruffy guy looks down at the ground and replied with a grunt. I tilt my sunglasses up and look at them. A younger looking guy with a beanie breaks off from his friends and walks over to me. "Hey, the names Jesse. That's a pretty hot car, mind if I look at it?" I raise my eyebrow and shrug. "Help yourself." And I pop the hood. The kid named Jesse pops his head in and starts naming all of the parts left and right. I feel kind of impressed. Then I see a taller man with a rather large build approach Nick and me.

"These your cars?" I look up at him and curse my shortness. "Yeah," I say, "The Skyline's mine, and the RX-8 is Nicks." I point over to RX-8. The big guy shakes Nick's hand. "Dominic Toretto." He takes a quick look around our cars. His facial gestures tell us that he approves. "Not bad, I guess I'll be seeing you two around L.A. sooner or later." He nods his head and walks away with his team. They hop in their cars, one carrying an armful of food from vending machines, and take off onto the freeway. I watch as the group of cars gets smaller and smaller as they drive away.

Nick slowly tilts his head to face me "Dude, you just shook hands with the king of the streets," I stare at him wide eyed. Nick just laughs and replies, "Yeah. I guess I did. But you know what? I'm gonna have to race him soon, and I'll win." I turn around and walk back over to my Skyline. "Whatever." I take a seat and flip on some tunes.

I couldn't hear it over the music at first, but I soon realize that my phone is ringing. I arch my back and dig my cell phone out of my back pocket. "Hello?" A guys voice fills the other end. "It's me, Onel. What's up?" he replies. I snap out of my train of thought. "Uh, nothing. Just sitting at some rest stop in California, that's all. You gotta come visit us at L.A. and race, you'll love it." There is a silence on the other end. I hear nicks voice, "Danielle who are you talking to?" I look back at nick "It's Onel." Nick shakes his head and laughs "Oh, your boyfriend," making and messed up face. I start to turn red. "Shut up Nick, or I'll key your car!" He jumps back and walks away muttering "Crazy bitch." Without even turning around I lower the phone and shout, "I heard that!"

I finish up my conversation with Onel and click the phone off. Nick is over sitting in his car sleeping. I yank his beanie down over his face. He jumps up and hits his head on the roof. "Ouch! What was that for?" He looks at me and rubs his head. "Man, it's getting dark. We need to get moving because we still have a little bit more driving 'till we hit L.A. We gotta make a big entrance, but we can't do that if we get there after everyone has left." Nick turns over the engine, "Okay then, lets go," he says. "But did you really have to do that?" I laugh and walk over to my car, "Yeah." I turn on my car and follow Nick out onto the freeway. After only a few minutes of driving, we turn off the freeway and watch the Los Angeles skyline creep around the corner.

We pull into the downtown area and find nothing. At a stoplight, I just see a few imports out of the side of my eyes as they make a turn. They might be our only chance. No time for us to chill at a bar, we need to move. I beep Nick on my Nextel, "Follow me." I shift into first and pull into the turn lane ignoring the red light, and Nick follows suit.

"Where are we going?" Nick radios me.

"Just follow me." I shout back. I keep the cars just inside my field of vision and follow them behind some old market. The sound of cars and music grows louder and louder until we round the corner to see cars lined up along the alley. We find a couple of spots and pull in. We kill the engines and take a seat on our hoods, waiting for Toretto and his team.


	2. I Almost beat him

Nick taps me on my shoulder. "Hey. Do you think Dominic was being serious back at the rest stop?"

"About what?" I reply.

"About us having nice cars and him seeing us around. Do you think he was being serious or just pulling our chain?"

I thought back for a moment. "He looked pretty serious to me." In fact, it seemed to me like he was looking forward to running into us. But I didn't say anything. Nick turned around and sat down in his car. I stayed perched on my hood and surveyed the people around me, a lot of cars and a lot of people. They filled up the alley like a fluorescent can of sardines. I peered up and down the area several times, but no sign of Toretto and his team.

After about half an hour, I start to notice that our cars are getting some attention. It has escalated from passing glances to people stopping to get a better look. A few people actually decided to come up to me and take a look around. I kept a close eye on things while Nick sat in his car sleeping no doubt. I rolled my eyes. Always sleeping. I sat on the hood of my car and yawned slightly.

It was getting late, so the traffic in had come to a halt. The only people that still weren't there were Toretto's team. Then the sound of high performance engines filled the night. Coming from the street, it steadily got louder until ten gleaming headlights rounded the corner. My eyes darted and people started gathering around. Team Torreto had finally arrived. I smirked and bit on my lip piercing. People came from every end of the meeting, and all converged around the five cars. I pushed my way through the crowd and noticed the guy with the Skyline was talking to Jesse, I think that's what his name was. I bided my time and looked over the vehicles, a Jetta, a Maxima, a 240sx, a Skyline, and of course the RX-7. Jesse noticed me standing there and walked over.

"Hey, you racing tonight?'

I looked at him and smirked "Why do you think I'm here? Just to be another ricer?" he laughed slightly. I pointed over to Nick in his car.

"He wants to race Dominic bad. He went all egocentric on me today after you guys left."

"I don't know if Dom will race him. But even if they do race, he doesn't stand a snowball's chance in Hell against Dom."

"Whatever you say. You may be surprised." Jesse and I push through the thick crowd surrounding Dominic Toretto. Jesse talks to him and lets him know that we're here and ready to go. He points out Nick's car. Dom sends Vince over there and I follow. He peers through the tinted glass and then bangs on Nick's window. I started laughing because we wanted to scare the shit out of him.

I stood back and watched. Nick snaps his head up from the inside of his car and Vince opens up the door and looks at Nick and laughs. He grabs him by the collar and drags him over to Dominic Dom clears his throat. "So, you want to race me?" Nick stands silent for a moment and then looks over at me.

I stare at him "Go for it man, don't be a pussy." Letty and Mia laugh and I shrug my shoulders. Nick looks at Dominic, "Yeah, I wanna race you." Dom leans in to shake is hand. "Let's do it then. Unless you get stage fright."

Nick grabs his and, "Let's do it. They shake hands and Nick walks back over to his car and starts setting things up. I can hear some music blaring from the speakers of his car. I walk over and sit back on the hood of my Skyline. The other guy with the yellow R-33 approaches me.

"Nice ride chick. What's your name?" I look at him for a moment

"Its Danielle" I light up a cigarette and exhale the smoke and asked him the same. "Leon," he says. I ditch the cigarette and look at Leon and ask him in curiosity. "So, is there a party or something after this thing? Me and my partner in crime have been living in our cars for the past three weeks."

"We'll that's depends on your friend does in the race." Leon kneels down do get a low profile view of my car.

"What if there's a party or not?"

"No. If you're invited." With that, he stood up and left. He walked through the crowd and back over to Dom's circle.

I shrug my shoulders slightly and slide off the hood of my car. I turn and open up the driver side door and sit down. I tap my fingers on the steering wheel and flipped up my Nextel

"Nick you gotta visualize the win! Do it man!"

He beeped back "Okay, I will." I threw my phone in the passenger seat and watched has his car rolled past. I waited and eventually heard the sound of the cars at the line and then the sound of burning rubber. I knew the race started.

I sit around for a couple more minutes and Nick beeps me back "Get over here."

I start up my car drive over. There's a large crowd of people around his car. I push my way to the front and could see Dominic. He had a surprised look on his face. I over heard him saying, "Who knew kids from Florida could race so good". I smiled and walked over to Nick.

"I guess you won."

He was sitting on the hood of his car with his head in his hands.

"Are you okay?"

He looked up at me. He was fine; in fact, he was smiling more than I had ever seen him before. "Half a length. I lost by half a length. Can you believe that?"

"Are you serious? Man that's a bummer."

"Are you kidding?" He stood up and said, "That's the most awesome thing that's happened to me since I got my license."

"What, losing?"

"No, I was this close," He held up his fingers about and inch apart, "This close to beating Dominic Toretto!"

I can't believe this kid. He lost but he's happier than he has ever been before. At this point, his antics have attracted a fair amount of attention.

Dominic walks through the crowd over to us, followed by the whole crew. Hector pops out of nowhere from behind us a slaps Nick on the shoulder with a stack of greenbacks. "Not bad." He says.

Then a deep voice replied, "Not bad indeed." It was none other than Dom himself. Leon ran up next to him and whispered something in Dom's ear.

He said to us, "You guys should stop by later. It's time to go." Then, louder, but still calmly, "Okay people we've got incoming. Let's get out of here."

Leon walked up to me "I guess you guys are invited to the party after all." he said with a smirk and ran off to his car.


	3. Missing in action

Everyone started scrambling for there cars. You could here the sirens in the distance. The cops weren't here yet, but they would be soon. There is just enough time for Nick to give me a brief summary of the race.

"So we were neck and neck. The other two cars were right behind us and the finish line was coming up. And then…"

"Oh, shit!" I interrupted him.

"What?"

"Do you know where Toretto lives?"

There was a brief moment of silence, and then a mad dash to our vehicles. "Shit! Which way did they go?" I scream as I fall into the drivers seat.

"Just follow me! I think I can see them!" Nick shouts back as he starts his car. He burns out and shoots past me. I pull a quick U-turn to find a wall of cars in front of us. I pick up the Nextel a beep Nick. "How the hell are we going to find them?"

"I don't know," Nick yells back, "I think they turned up th-Shit! Follow me!" Suddenly his car jerked to the right, almost hitting another car. I barely managed to squeeze in behind him. We are on a small side street now, and then Nick turns into a tiny alleyway. Our mirrors almost scrape the walls as we rocket through the narrow corridor. We drive a block or two before we see cars driving across the alley up ahead. The lead car is the most vibrantly painted red coupe I had ever seen. It could only be Toretto. Sure enough, I saw another flash of red, then blue, yellow, and white, all the colors of Toretto's team. That confirms it. A few seconds later, we fly out of the alley and drift in right behind them.

We follow them and I notice Dominic turns into a parking garage. I beep Nick on the Nextel "Where the Hell is he going?"

Nick beeps back "I don't know, just go on without me. I'll catch up with you later." I roll my eyes and throw my phone in the passenger seat. I step on the accelerator and speed up behind Letty. She smiles and rolls down her window "Follow us to the fort." I nod and follow them.

We drive into a neighborhood called Echo Park. We all pull up to a white, older-looking house and park it. I step out my car. They all step out of their respected vehicles. I look up at Letty "Does that always happen? The cops having there shit together like that?" Leon and Vince shake there head no and motion me inside the house.

I sit down on the couch and fifteen minutes later more and more people come to the Toretto's house. I catch some glances from people as they start conversations in small corners of the house and the kitchen. I notice a guitar in the corner and my eyes widen as I read what kind it is, "Gibson…" Vince walks over and sees me staring at it. His voice asked questionably "You play guitar?" I look up at him.

"Yeah. I've been playing since I was thirteen."

Vince nods "I've been playin' about the same." The party started in full swing. I haven't seen Nick for at least a half an hour. I move past some people and walk to my car and open the door reaching for my Nextel "Nick, where the fuck are you?"


	4. 3,000 miles and after parties

Chapter 4.

I sat in my car waiting 15 more minutes anxiously.

My thoughts "Jesus fucking Christ Nick !".

I threw my phone on the dash and lit up a cigarette and exhaled the smoke and just stared at my phone.

Foots steps could be heard coming up the drive way to the Torretto's house.

I felt a tap on my shoulder and dropped my cigarette the cherry falling my lap "mother fucker !"

Nick Laughed " I can see you missed me" I retorted "Oh shut the fuck up were where you asshole!".

I glared at him .

Nick looked at the ground like a puppy with his tale between his legs .

Knowing quite well he was facing the wrath of my unmerciful bitch fest.

" Danielle those cops turned the shit up, and some other guy followed us we ran into some shit ".

I got this sick feeling in my stomach like we were getting dragged along for a ride.

" Oh really nick oh please do tell me what kind of fucking shit !"

Dom replied trying to settle down this slight altercation with my friend and I.

" Listen little lady I didn't mean to catch heat from the cops like everyone else let's just say it was wrong place wrong time deal okay".

I got up from my car flicking my cigarette away.

"fine, fine" I throw my arms out in response .

We all walked up the steps the party was till on it had only been a half an hour.

Everyone looked up as the nick closed the front door behind him.

Leon Got up "Good to have you back the fort brotha" slapping him on the back.

He gave Leon and Vince a look _Your asses are in for it tomorrow afternoon._

Letty walked up to him come on I want to massage trying to distract him from the racing skanks I found this amusing that girl has the dude on a tight chain.

As Dom and Letty walked up the stairs he looked at Nick and I

" You two are welcome to stay here tomorrow maybe we can help you get known around here:"

Leon walked up to me " Welcome to Echo Park kids."

Me and Nick looked at each other did it just happen did

Dominic Toretto the king of the streets invite us to stay at his house ?!.

Nick just stared and was still trying to process the nights events,

grabbing a beer and sitting down on the couch.

I sat down next to him " so dude you looked like you just died"

He replied " Danielle I think things are going to look up for us"

I looked back at him " I hope so dude cause if things get shitty I'm so getting that bat out of my trunk and busting a headlight".

I got up and left him alone some people started crowding around him I was getting claustrophobic .

Making my way thru the kitchen Mia smiled and walked over

" Hi you looked so lost tonight I see you've met letty and pretty much the whole team".

I nodded

" Yeah I'm just so exhausted driving 3,0000 miles finally getting here and then getting chased by the cops definitely not a every night thing for me".

She laughed with at my sarcasm "well we have two extra room's downstairs in the basement, would you like to get some rest ? "

I stood there and thought of the offer " Yeah I really appreciated it let me just go get my stuff out of the car". I walked back thru the living room the music was still cranking and people were still dancing and laughing away. Hopping down the steps and grabbing my duffle bag from the trunk then walking back .

I walked back into the kitchen Mia led me down the stairs

"Hope you don't mind the messy cloths Jesse lives in other room"

she motioned to the room across from the room and the bathroom in hallway

I was staying in .

"Oh it's no problem".

The room was painted a dark red there was full size mattress with a feather down and black pillows.

I thought to myself some of my posters and other little things would look rad on these walls.

Turned around back to Mia " hey thank you again". She smiled and replied "it's no problem its not very often my brother let's kids into house but he must see something good in you guys".

I shrugged " yeah I guess so, " .

She closed the door behind me and I heard the creaking of the stairs.

I sat down on the bed and said out loud to myself "so beats the back seat of the skyline any day"


	5. Welcomings and wake up calls

Chapter 5

The sun gleamed thru the crooked blinds in the living room my head was pounding and the sounds of cook could be heard. I looked around beer bottles covered the coffee table I must have passed out .

Then something clicked _where's Danielle ?. _

I got up and walked to the kitchen Dom was sitting at the kitchen table reading the paper .

He looked up at me and said " See you're an early riser too "

he slide a bottle of Advil across my way grabbing the bottle and tossing two in my mouth. " thanks man, " .

Dom looked up at Mia

"when's breakfast going to be done Mia geese !"

she looked at him " Dom shut up or I'll stop making breakfast why don't you go wake the rest of them up".

She turned to me

"Nick why don't you have seat "

" Oh okay" I shrugged slightly looking out the window.

Dom folded his paper

" So nick good race last we need more kids like you around here so how long you out here for?".

I glanced back

" For awhile D and I still need to find a job and place to live and shit".

He took a sip of coffee "well we can give you guys trial run see how well you do at our garage earn your keep you know".

My eyes widened I heard he was the toughest guy in Los Anglos . I thought about this for a moment a chance to prove my parent could make on my own with my best friend.

I looked at my hands "Sounds like awesome plan I appreciate so much Dom"

He Smirked " Good you start today You and Danielle".

Mia Set down plates and juice.

Dom got up from the his chair and walked out of the kitchen.

Banging on doors could be hear and the sounds of "fuck you", "five more minutes" could be heard

Mia laughed and shook her head "Coyote and Leon never change".

She looked up at me the sunlight hit her face very well her brown eyes looked at me

I felt myself starting to get lost.

"Could you run downstairs and wake up Jesse and Danielle ?"

I didn't hear a word from her.

I just trailed off " Yeah sure…".

Proceeding down the creaky steps my thoughts were_ ._

_Danielle hates waking up early but her ass needs to get schedule going ._

I knocked on a car sponsored covered door assuming it was Jesse's but I noticed him walking out of the bathroom " Hey dude I'm already up I had to scoot some chaser outta my bed early".

I smirked " ha it's all good man" He ran up the stairs.

I knocked on other door banging on it no answer I tried again still no response.

Grabbing the door handle and opening the door,

Danielle laid passed out under the covers unseen curled up in a little ball.

I gulped really hard and prayed she wouldn't punch me in the face for being so tiny.

"D wake up dude breakfast man the whole team's up" I pushed her shoulder slightly I tried again.

" Danielle wake up I'm fucking hungry we have to get to the garage soon".

Getting frustrated about to give up I climbed up the stairs I looked at Leon "hey man you want to help me wake up sleeping beauty her ass isn't budging". He smirked " sure man I'll make her fly outta that bed soo fast"

Me and Him ran down the creaking steps and went into her room. Staring not sure what to do

" I have feelin' she's like Letty dude that chick will slug you if even touch while she's out".

I looked back at him " I usually don't wake her up for that reason " I laughed.

We both moved towards the bed Leon climbed on the bed and started jumping on it.

"hey girl wake your ass up you know you want breakfast" she stared at me her eyes locked on me

" Nick it's like 8:30 !!" she flung the covers off and looked at Leon he jumped off the bed and stared at her.

" Yeah bro she's def a little letty right there man".

We watched her storm off into the bathroom.


End file.
